


The Spark

by elstarwarslover



Series: The Search for Perfection [2]
Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, In which Lúcio decides to rebel, but not before a spark
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-27
Updated: 2017-08-14
Packaged: 2018-10-23 14:40:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 4
Words: 5,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10721346
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elstarwarslover/pseuds/elstarwarslover
Summary: Lúcio learns to be a proper leader in the midst of Vishkar's oppression





	1. Play Hard

Lúcio responded to the news the same way he responded to any big change: by throwing a massive party.

He had expected Calado to get the bid.  After all, Calado always got the bid.  He was _Calado_.  And, tyrant though he was, his tyranny was at least predictable.  Sure, everyone lived in poverty in large part due to his "protection fees," and the real estate he owned was well overpriced, especially considering its poor quality.  On the whole, though, the people of Rio de Janeiro were all still free to do as they pleased.  And as for Lúcio?  Well, between street hockey and performance, he made more than enough money to provide for himself and anyone else who was down on their luck that week.  Not that Calado knew that, lest he spike the prices again.

Lúcio hadn't expected Calado's entire business to go up in flames - literally - overnight.  But it did, and just like that, Vishkar's bid was the only one left standing.  And despite all of the promises (Lúcio guessed that at least half of them were blatant lies), there was one thing that he and Vishkar both knew: change was coming for Rio de Janeiro, and it was coming fast.

So, like always, Lúcio threw a party.  Invitation only, of course, although this was mostly a formality now that Calado's hired thugs had no reason to try anything.  He had to handwrite them (he saved any spare change he could get for better music equipment), although this was nothing new.  Afterwards, he set out making a playlist for the party.  Some, he had to write, given that this situation deserved something specific.  There was just this feeling of wariness mixed with hope, which nothing already out there seemed to get.  He also remixed some of his old stuff - changing music for changing times.  And finally, some classics; old songs that resonated with everyone.  Of course, it was all dance music; after all, he was throwing a party, not a funeral.  It was time to celebrate!  Right?

Altogether, the process took him about a month from conception to fruition.  And _God_ , did that month feel like the longest of his life.

Vishkar had wasted no time in taking away the rights of Rio de Janeiro's poor.  It was maybe three days after their bid when a group of kids was arrested for trespassing and vandalism (nevermind the fact that they were playing on what _should have been_ public property).  Despite outrage from the whole of the favela, the mayor made no move to restrict Vishkar's influence over the police force.  In fact, her words bordered on supporting them in spite of her duty to the public.  Of course, anyone who had seen the new car she was sporting would not be surprised by this, but she didn't regularly make visits to the poor district even when she was dependent on their votes for power.  Soon after that, any street peddling, performance, even recreation was effectively outlawed.  Not in so many words, of course, but the mayor's decision to "enforce the laws of the city as they were intended to be followed" meant a significantly greater police force on the streets at the price of every freedom that the favela had come to enjoy.

Yes, the precedent set had become one of expanded government interference.  At the same time, many of the services the mayor's office provided began to dwindle, in both resources and people.  Donations to food banks and soup kitchens were rejected for reasons that were as unclear to the people serving as to the people being served.  Public health services were scaled back en masse, and almost immediately afterwards, everyone in the favela seemed to catch the same cough (at least, Lúcio hoped it was just a cough).  Lúcio could only imagine what the kids were going through in school, although they tended not to talk too much about it, so he didn't really know.

And yet, the more Vishkar tightened its death grip on the community, the more familiar it seemed.  Although Calado's thugs were irrelevant now, the "protection fees" had really only transferred to the bribes to the police force.  And despite the seemingly perpetual hunger that tortured his age group and those younger than him, he got the idea from older generations that this was par for the course.  The cough was new, although it was nothing that people couldn't deal with, since it wasn't all that intrusive, and it didn't seem to be life-threatening in any way.  Some homeopathic remedies, and people went about their daily business as though nothing was happening.

Even still, Lúcio thought the favela needed a celebration.  After all, if Vishkar did go through with even half of its promises, the favela would be improved forever.  Well, maybe not forever, since hard light could be dismantled in an instant, but at least as long as Vishkar kept its bid.  And for all of the amenities it would supposedly offer, the payments to a foreign corporation were a small price to pay.  Had they not dealt with Calado's taxes for decades now?

So in spite of the danger, Lúcio kept performing on street corners, always sure to pay off nearby officers well beforehand.  He kept handing out invitations (he had only made 400, but he made sure everyone knew that one invitation could be used for a whole family, if they so desired).  He kept writing, and rewriting music, everything from his daily feelings to more complex analyses of the situation of the favela.  He poured his soul into his songs, always sure to censor himself while he was practicing, lest he be shut down before he could properly share them with the world.

And the night of the party?  He had a blast.  Being a family event, it started relatively early, with a few families wandering in to the sound of his old music.  Lúcio liked to start there, since he knew the kids would recognize it better, having heard it more.  He didn't see many he recognized tonight, although Rosa and her mom did show up, which surprised him given that Rosa had not yet returned to school after her burn.  In any case, it was good to see her out again, and enjoying herself at that.

As the night sped on, Lúcio began introducing more and more remixes and new music, since the new crowd would be looking for something more novel to keep them entertained.  Besides, the families with younger kids, including Rosa's, had already left, along with anyone who was genuinely worried about the curfew.  His new guests were mostly young adults, who had a lot of time and energy, and nothing to do with either.  These came more to forget than to be entertained.  So Lúcio distracted them with every tool in his arsenal, reveling in the energy of what had become the dance floor below him.

It was then that he heard the first gunshot.


	2. Work Hard

The shot rang through the crowded warehouse that Lúcio had commandeered for his party.  Almost immediately, the people near the back stopped dancing, and the energy that had once sustained the crowd dwindled quickly as people realized exactly what they had heard.

Lúcio, of course, knew immediately that something was wrong.  Even had he not noticed the fear that spread like wildfire through the crowd, he knew his own music well enough to know that there was no gunshot noise in any of his songs, not even the remixes.  And so he launched himself over the edge of the stage, neglecting to so much as turn the music down.

"All right, make a path for me, I'm gonna go check on what just happened.  I'm sure everything is fine.  You all just stay in here and enjoy okay?  Maybe grab some punch, sit down if you're feeling lightheaded, you know the drill.  All right?  All right?  Okay," he refrained as he pushed his way through the crowd, making sure to keep a smile on his face and his posture loose.  After all, if he did not act calm, how could he expect anyone else to?  He didn't exactly believe what he was saying, not really, but it was a white lie at best.  Something to prevent the situation —whatever it turned out to be— from escalating.  Unfortunately, his lie was transparent at best, given that the people closest to him did not seem all that reassured by his passing.  He couldn't focus long enough to see the reactions of anyone deeper in the crowd.

What he found outside was as bad as he had feared.  There were a few people scattered about looking horrified, but the majority had crowded into a tight circle near the back fence.  Across from them was a growing wall of mercenaries, who seemed to be advancing slowly on his guests.  Lúcio realized that this had been the origin of the gunshot, approached and immediately noticed a woman lying on the ground between the crowd and the mercenaries.

He grabbed onto the nearest person and looked them dead in the eye before commanding them, "Listen to me.  Are you listening?  Good.  I keep a first aid kit backstage.  Here's my pass to get in.  Bring her back there and patch her up.  If you don't know how, find someone who does.  Do you understand?  Good, now go."

He then directed his attention to the wall officers inching closer to him.  They seemed to offer no remorse, no pity, no... anything really.  In fact, they seemed to him like this was just an ordinary day, something they would complain about back at home to equally disinterested spouses and children.  Didn't they see what was happening?  Couldn't they understand how important this would be?   _ Don't they see they're strangling us? _

Noticing no signs of stopping, however, Lúcio appealed to a more direct route.  "Listen," he called out.  "We're not hurting anyone.  You can see that.  So why are you here?  Why don't you just go home?"  No response.  "Look, we came out here where no one was; I mean I get that the music's pretty loud, but you can barely hear it out here, and we're kilometers away from any residential area."  Still no response.  The officers were getting uncomfortably close, and the group behind Lúcio had already begun to back up in response.  He tried again.  "Hey, there's no need for all of this, we'll leave, okay?  Just wanted to have some fun.  Let loose every now and again, you know?"

Finally, a response echoed from down the line.  "You and everyone here are guilty of violating curfew and noise regulations, trespassing, and disturbing the peace.  It's our job to bring you in so that you can be appropriately punished."

"Wait you're trying to arrest us?  For  _ this? _  We're not even doing anything, not really."

"You are out past curfew.  That is enough to arrest you, even without the plethora of evidence against you."

"You're serious?  Oh  _ Hell  _ no, we're going home tonight."  With this statement, he took a step forward, so that he was touching the merc in front of him, daring him to step forward again.  "You hear me?  We're going home tonight!" he shouted, hopefully loud enough to be heard inside the warehouse.

Clearly, he had done the right thing, since he could hear the crowd behind him beginning to murmur.  "We're going home tonight!" he screamed one last time, hoping and, for the first time in many years, praying that the crowd would play off his energy the way they always did.  And with that, he pushed, leveraging his weight and decades of hockey to throw the man in front of him backwards and break the line.

Thank God it paid off.  The instant the officer hit the ground, people started pouring around them and through the formerly impregnable wall.  Lúcio ensured that the officer wasn't being trampled, since people did have a tendency to lose track of their own behavior in a mob.  Once that was done, he rushed back to make sure as many people got out as possible.

"Everyone listen up!  Vishkar's outside, and they're not very happy.  Here's what's going to happen: all of you are going to go outside, you're going to find a hole in their lines, and you're going to run through it.  You're also going to stay in groups because you do  _ not _ want to be singled out by these guys okay?  Then you're going to head directly home, turn out all of your lights, and you're going to stay there until the morning.  Everybody got me?  Good.  Now go!"  And then he got out of the way and found a nice, conspicuous place to stand where people could find him easily.

He spent the next few minutes scouting out places to run, and occasionally to hide, as people came to him looking for direction.  For the most part, it was unnecessary.  The mercs' command structure was loose at best, and they hadn't come prepared for a riot, so all it took to overrun them was a big enough group of people whose only goal was to get out. 

Then, as the crowds began to wear thin, and the mercs began to regain control, Lúcio began to ferry people through the holes he found, and even creating a few when necessary.

However, even this could not last forever, and the officers regrouped and made another push, this time using hard-light bullets instead of the weaker (although still lethal) rubber bullets they had previously been using.  And God Almighty was it effective.  Whatever fighting spirit the few hundred remaining people had left began to die rapidly.  Looking around, Lúcio saw there was good reason for it.  There were people (mostly civilians, although there were some cops too) lying everywhere, writhing in pain; at a glance, no one looked seriously injured, but the threat of unbearable pain and the disabilities that sometimes came with hard-light bullets was enough to make anyone think twice, even in a mob.  So Lúcio took action once more.

He approached the woman leading the mercs, or at the very least, the one who had yelled at him earlier.  Seeing her entourage raise their weapons at him, he raised his hands and stopped.  

"Look.  These people, they're not bad people.  They came here because I told them to."

"It's far too late for bargaining, ruffian.  Besides, these people know the consequences of breaking the law."

"No, no, you don't understand.  My voice has a lot of power in these parts.  You're not from here, you wouldn't know that I guess.  But, for the most part, they do what I say.  What I'm saying is that without me, they wouldn't, couldn't even, group up again, not in any serious way.  But you can't catch me.  I'm faster than every one of you here.  So let's make a deal."

"No.  Like I said, it's too late to make a deal."  She then turned to one of the other officers and ordered him to "arrest this idiot."

Of course, he never got that chance, since Lúcio had already moved well out of range by the time he had gotten out his handcuffs.  "One last chance.  You don't want anyone else to get hurt.  Neither do I.  So let's work something out."

The officer paused, considering this.  "Fine.  We take you and half of the people left here."

"No can do.  You let them go and you can have me.  Otherwise you'll just have another riot on your hands tomorrow, the day after, and every day after that."

"And how do I know I can trust you?"

"You can trust me.  I'll stay right here, but I'm going to watch every person who can still walk get out of here before you lay a finger on me.  Got it?"

"Okay.  They're free to go.  The ones who can't walk stay in our custody though."

_ Damn.  Well, at least they'd be hospitalized.  Hopefully. _

"Okay.  Let's do this."


	3. Lucio does it well

“Lúcio Correia dos Santos: you are one lucky man.”  The woman stood across from the overcrowded cell in which her cousin now sat.  Rio de Janeiro’s prisons were chronically full, the result of an overzealous police force combined with sweeping laws that made just about any aspect of poverty criminal.  Vishkar’s additions to those laws had only served to exacerbate the problem, and with none of their quality-of-life improvements anywhere in sight, no one could seem to figure out exactly why they had been given so much power in the first place.

“Isabella!  Well if you’re here I must be,” Lúcio responded as he stood up, careful to avoid any hands or toes that might be in the way.  “What brings you out here anyway?”

“You, obviously.  How’d you manage to get stuck in here?”

“Out past curfew, same as everyone else here.”

“You and I both know that’s not the full story.  Are you going to tell me now or am I going to have to come back with  _ Avó _ ?”

“All right, all right.  After you and Rosa left last night, some Vishkar goons showed up and started attacking people outside the warehouse.  I managed to get a lot of people out, but not enough.  So I turned myself in, gave everybody else a chance to get out.” Lúcio paused for a second, remembering the events of last night.  He wondered if Vishkar had actually provided any medical care for the people who got injured last night; none of them was in jail with him, but that didn’t really mean anything with the number of police lockups in the city.  Not even to mention that with how dark it had been, he wasn’t sure he could recognize any of them.  “How’s Rosa doing?”

“Okay.  Better every day, but still not great.  She’s fine physically, but I think she blames a lot of this on herself.  Something about not having been nice enough to Vishkar.”

“Any idea what she means by that?”

“Not a clue.  Some woman pulled her out of the fire after Calado’s office exploded.  There’s no way she would remember her though.  She was completely unconscious when the woman handed her to me.  Although she  _ was _ wearing Vishkar colors.”

“Odd.  Rosa’s smart, though.  She’ll find a way to tell us.”

“That’s all we can hope for.  Anyway, I’m not just here to chat.”

“I figured as much.  What’s up?”

“A bunch of us came together and decided we needed to get you out.  The state will provide you a lawyer, but you’ll have to seek them out.  Which you can only do from the outside this building.”

“What?  No, no I can’t let you do that.  You  _ need _ that money.  Much more than I do.  Besides, I’ve got good standing in the community, no judge will ignore that”

“It’s a good thing that enough people disagree with you that you’re still getting out of here.  We had to get a bondsman to pay for you; as soon as his check clears, you’re out of here.  Thought I’d come and let you know.”

“I-” Lúcio sighed.  “Thank you.”

“One last thing before I go.  I don’t know if you saw the news today, but it read something to the effect of ‘Fifteen  _ Brave _ Officers Injured in Battle with  _ Violent _ Protesters.’”

“Shit, really?  God, okay.  I’ll - I’ll figure something out,” Lúcio responded.

“Good.  I’ll see you around,” Isabella said, turning on her heel to leave.

Hours later, Lúcio had come no closer to deciding what exactly he was going to do.  Of course, he was finally out of that godforsaken cell, which helped his thought process significantly.

There were a few things of which he was certain.  First, that he could no longer afford to bribe the city’s officers.  Such bribes were always crowd-funded to some extent, and with most of the favela’s money having gone to a bondsman, there was just none left.  Second, that he could no longer raise money with street performances.  After all, it was effectively illegal with Vishkar’s influence over the city, regardless of the letter of the law.

That wasn’t to say that protest music would be completely ineffective.  If he somehow managed to get people listening globally, there would be enough pressure on Rio de Janeiro’s government that they would be forced to back down.  At least, that would be the ideal situation.  More likely than not, one of the more powerful countries would place an embargo on Brazil, and all of the country’s internal resources would immediately go to those who were wealthy enough to pay for them in bulk.  Even if there were any left after that, Vishkar would be more than happy to buy up the rest in some sick form of punishment.

The most likely scenario, though, was that he would write and publish whatever music he could, and it would have no effect at all.  After all, he had been writing his whole life, and nothing had come of it to date; why would this time be any different?

Lúcio did not get a chance to answer that question.  Instead, he froze in place as a grating shriek filled the air, replacing the content murmurs of the street.  Unable to move or even think for himself, he listened as an unnatural voice informed the people of the favela that curfew would be an hour early tonight, since violent factions within the city had taken advantage of the mayor’s generosity.  It was a matter of safety, the voice asserted; the mayor would not allow rioters to undo the carefully crafted order that Vishkar had brought.

The voice cut out as suddenly as it had begun, the only evidence of its existence in the stunned silence that suffocated the once vibrant street.  Worse still, Lúcio felt compelled to obey the voice, as though whatever had been affecting his thoughts were still in control.  It would certainly be easier to obey; he wouldn’t have to deal with the cops, the thugs, the stress, any of it.

Still, some part of him screamed out that he had to resist, that this wasn’t normal.

The sound of a small voice humming one of his songs broke Lúcio out of his stupor.  He still felt foggy, but at least his thoughts were – probably – his own now.  He looked around and saw the once lively crowd beginning to thin.  The small voice was gone now, lost to the oppressive silence that refused to go away.  In fact, where Lúcio had come to expect hundreds, even thousands of voices at a time, there were only the slight sounds of feet and shoes scuffing against the pavement and an incessant ringing in his ears.

“Wait, what time is it?” he asked to no one in particular.  He didn’t honestly expect anyone to answer him; there were enough people that each one would expect someone else to check.  He did expect the people around him to acknowledge that he had spoken, to offer him a glance, a touch, anything to show that they had heard him.

He received no such sign, however, and the only evidence that anyone was even aware of his existence was in the subtle way that they flowed around him without so much as a bump.

_ What’s… happening? _

Was Vishkar’s tech really that powerful?  Enough to take complete control of so many people?

It was clear that someone had to do something.  And given that Lúcio was the only one who seemed to be awake right now, it would have to be him.  But what would he do?  He could take it, but then what?  He couldn’t keep it, it was too powerful for anyone to have.  He could destroy it, but Vishkar would just rebuild it.

Would it be right to use it to convince the people to rebel?  Knowing they would have little choice in the matter?  What if he only gave them a little nudge?  A slight push towards what he knew to be the right decision?

Of course, that wasn’t the right answer either.  These people trusted him, and he wouldn’t betray that trust by deciding for them.

However, there was one potential solution that might actually work out: reversing its effects to repel mind control.  Vishkar would almost certainly rebuild its amplifiers, but that didn’t mean they were infallible.  And although there wasn’t any evidence that they did anything other than mess with people’s heads, Lúcio was willing to bet that, given enough time, he could reverse the effects.

_ Well, I guess I’m about to find out. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys! Sorry for the wait on this, a bunch of things came up (and I had to scrap my original idea because it didn't flow well lol). Isabella isn't a canon character as far as I know, but she's Lucio's first cousin. Her full name is Isabella Carvalho Correia, Carvalho being her maternal family name and Correia being her paternal family name (note that this does make her Jewish, as Carvalho is a Sephardic name). I don't know if that will become important later or not, just because I don't yet know how important she and Rosa will be. Who knows? Y'all might get a full work or two just about her and Rosa.


	4. Finale

“People of Rio de Janeiro.  My friends.  My family.”

Lúcio almost felt disappointed.  He had been prepared, maybe even over prepared, for some resistance at the factory.  A big fight, running under gunfire, hell even having to avoid some patrols.  After all, Vishkar held their most valuable possessions there.  It should not have been as simple as running in, knocking out two overworked guards, then having free reign of the place.

“Vishkar has sucked the soul from this city for far too long.”

What didn’t surprise him was what he found there.  First he found the automatic rifles the thugs had been using; after some quick deliberation, he decided to destroy them.  Although they would be helpful should he need to defend himself, that kind of weapon was not something he wanted in circulation.  He would just have to do without.  Then he found armor, presumably designed to protect its wearer from the very weapons he had just destroyed.  He kept as many as he could, and left the rest.  After all, if the armor happened to make its way onto the streets, there wasn’t much of a chance it’d make them any more dangerous.

“They come here demanding our labor, demanding our liberty, demanding our very lives.”

Finally, he made his way to the room where they were making the sonic technology.  Altogether, it was as unimpressive as the rest of the factory.  The speakers looked like ordinary speakers, and could probably be used as such.  Compared to the elegance of the hard light applications and the fearsomeness of the guns, the sonic tech was just… lackluster.  Lúcio flicked one of them on to make sure that he was, in fact, in the right room; the almost immediate feedback loop and the wave of pain that accompanied it told him he was.

“And what did they give us in return?  Tell me, have they given us anything?  Anything but more demands?”

Of course, getting the speakers and being able to use them were very different problems.  Now that he had them, he had to figure out how they worked, which involved taking them apart and rebuilding them many, many times.   _ Thank God for mass production. _  Once he had done that, he had to figure out what he should play with them.  Almost any song would work—as long as it was fast and loud enough to override other similar stimuli—but it couldn’t contain any lyrics, or it would have unintended side effects to say the least.  On top of that, it couldn’t be too loud or too fast lest it overstimulate anyone who listened.

“No!  They have done nothing for us!  They have done worse than nothing!  They have blamed us for their violence!  They have stolen our freedom when we would not give it!”

He finally settled on the instrumental version of one of his more family-friendly songs, originally intended as a warmup before he started getting into his heavier material.  It was light, upbeat, and most importantly, had enough different instruments in it to keep listeners from getting distracted.

“And now, today, they show up at our homes, demanding punishment for a fabricated crime, refusing us a trial just as they have refused us the basic rights afforded to every other person in the world!”

He finished programming the speaker to play it on repeat just in time, too.  He had just finished when the sound of another speaker (hopefully not an enhanced one) rang through the favela, instructing its people to give up the criminal who had broken into Vishkar’s factory, stolen many of its products, and destroyed the rest.  Lúcio strapped on his roller blades and rushed out into the street where he found yet another wall of enforcers armed with automatic rifles.

“Now I, for one, will not stand for it any longer!  Will you?”  At this point Lúcio was shouting into the crowd that had formed around them, and by their response, he guessed they would stand with him if and when the confrontation became violent.  Of course, he reminded himself, he wouldn’t have to guess if he would just use the enhanced speaker to give his speech a little boost.  But that would still be a violation of his people’s trust, so he left it to play its song quietly by his side.

“What say you we do something about it?” he finally asked the crowd, his voice lower this time.  A wave of cheers crashed into him, signaling the crowd’s loyalty to him, at least for the moment.  With that, he turned around to face the mercenaries, who had raised their guns to point at the crowd.  “This is our city.  Always has been, always will be.  Tell me, do you really want to fight us?”

“Apparently, you didn’t hear.  This city is under new leadership, boy.  So why don’t you sit down and tell us where the criminal who did this is, okay?”

Lúcio cracked a smile at that.  “You’re looking right at him, or didn’t your cameras show you that?”  Lúcio rushed at the enforcer, tackling him in the process.  “Run!” he shouted at the crowd behind him.  “To the mayor’s office!  This ends today!”

The enforcers’ line quickly broke as the crowd surged forward en route to oust the mayor who had done this to them.  The mercenaries were not to go down without a fight, though, and they began firing randomly into the mob.  Mercifully, Lúcio noticed, most of the bullets missed in the chaos.

However, it was only a matter of time until one of them hit a lucky shot.  When that finally happened, Lúcio boosted the volume on his speaker and skated over to the source of the scream.  The wound was… well it was pretty nasty.  “Is there a doctor here?  Someone?  Anyone?” Lúcio asked no one in particular.

Seeing no one approach, he got in closer to see if he could dress the wound himself.  As he did, he noticed something miraculous happening.  The wound seemed to be closing itself.  What’s more, by the time he got enough to get a good look at it, there was nothing to look at.  The wound was just gone.

“How do you feel?”

“Great, actually.  Why, how’s it look?”

“Well, not to alarm you, but it’s almost like you never got shot in the first place.  There’s nothing there.  Here, let me help you up.”

And just like that, it was done, and the favelans pushed forward again.  This time, Lúcio pushed with them, careful to stay close enough to the front that the enhanced speaker covered everyone, but not so far forward that anyone fell behind.Finally, despite the continued resistance from the mercenaries, Lúcio managed to guide the group to city hall and banged on the door.  

“Mayor Pereira!” Lúcio shouted at the locked building.  “It’s time to make a choice!  You either stand with the people of Rio de Janeiro or you stand with our oppressors!”  Lúcio waited for the mayor’s response.  He estimated that they only had a couple minutes before the hired guards caught up, and when that happened, he or an ally would have to be in charge of city hall.  Otherwise, there would inevitably be another skirmish, and the people were too tired to put up any more resistance.  “I repeat!  It is time to make your choice!”

He waited another ten seconds.  Which then became fifteen, twenty, thirty.  And still no sign of the mayor or her response.  “I’ll give you five more seconds before I break this door down.  Five.  Four.  Three.  Two.  One.”  Lúcio signaled to one of the stronger-looking members of the crowd to follow through with the threat; after all, Lúcio was wearing roller blades, which didn’t offer much in the way of traction.

When the door swung open, Lúcio looked inside to find absolute chaos.  It was as if the mayor had heard the commotion outside and left in a rush.  Well, if she truly was gone, then she had already chosen her side.  And if that were the case, then the battle was finally, mercifully over.  Vishkar would be forced to leave.  And God, did it feel good.

As the last waves of mercenaries began to flow in, they lost whatever fighting spirit they had had, seeing the government under the control of their enemies.  And although they would almost certainly retaliate when they had backup, for now the people would have a moment to breathe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Couple of things. First, I wanted to point out that calling a black man "boy," like the Vishkar merc does, is racist. Like really, really racist. I put that in there as a point to make him even more villainous, but in case this fic has any real impact do note that that is like #1 on the things you should not do. Second, I did intend this fic to be three chapters, but there ended up being so much content for the third chapter that I split it up, so y'all got some extra. Yippee! Finally, I had to make up a name for the mayor because she as yet does not have a canonical name. I chose more or less arbitrarily after looking up some common Brazilian surnames. Do note that most Portuguese people have two surnames, a maternal and a paternal. In this case, Pereira is the mayor's paternal surname. Hope you enjoyed! More is coming soon!


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